4 Ways to Improve Payment Collections at Your Medical Practice

It is four times more expensive to collect payments from patients than insurance. (Instamed)

Are you struggling to collect patient payments at your practice? If you are, this comes as no surprise seeing as patients continue to see rising deductible costs. These ever higher costs create a burden for both you and your patient base as they struggle to pay, and you struggle to collect.

How can your practice increase patient payment collections in 2019? Let’s dive in, and find out.

Price Transparency

Automated solutions exist to enable your practice to provide price transparency to your patient base. Now, this is more imperative than ever. Medical expenses are hard to budget for, and are often unexpected. If physicians are able to provide an upfront general cost breakdown of services, patients can then plan for procedure costs. (This, of course, only works for services that do not fall under the umbrella of “urgent medical care.”) For those patients enrolled on a high deductible plan, talk to them about what kind of costs they are likely to see. Transparency may be key to collecting money for the services rendered.

Appointment Reminders

Chances are, a member of your practice, or an automation system, already contacts patients about upcoming appointments. This is an opportunity to speak to the patient, or remind them, about an unpaid balance. Sometimes, individuals just forget that they owe money. A simple reminder may go a long way, and supplement your bottom line with money it is already owed.

Practice Management Software

If your practice has not yet invested in a practice management solution, it is time to. Practice management systems streamline payment collections in a number of ways.  These systems allow your billing staff to track past due bills, automate late fees, and even identify patients who fall behind in their payments. With practice management software, staff members harness the capability of running reports as needed to stay current on collection initiatives.

Collect Payments via Online Platforms

Has your practice ventured to allow online patient payments? One easy way to allow this is through your patient portal. Patients access the patient portal to send messages to providers, schedule appointments, or request their medical records. Why not allow them to pay their bill? This is an easy way to streamline the collection process and promote patient payments at your practice. If patients have the ability to pay their bills online, you are more likely to receive payments.

These are just four of the ways that your practice can increase payment at your practice. In what ways can your staff encourage your patients to pay their medical bills in a timely manner? Let us know.

Looking for a practice management system or a patient portal solution to help your practice collect? Call us today at 800-624-8233 or visit us at micromd.com.